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Ghana-born
actress and film producer Maame Adjei is off to South Africa to film the next
season of her travel web series 'Girl Going Places'.
Adjei is better known for co-producing 'An African City' and starring as Zainab
in the production dubbed the African version of ‘Sex and the
City’. But the Ghanaian-American is also carving a name for herself as a bit of
a travel guru. Her aim is to encourage more Africans to visit destinations
within their home continent.

Maame Adjei plays Zainab in

'An African City' sourced from

msadjei.com

Travelling
culture

Adjei
believes Ghanaians do not tend to travel internally for pleasure or leisure
because “it is just not part of our culture,” she told MisBeee. “My mother
would never go to the north unless it’s for work or a funeral. You don’t just
get up one day and say: ‘hey let’s take a trip…’ And that’s an issue because
when we have someone from say Norway who drops in Ghana gets on a trotro and
next thing you know is in Tamale and tells a story about Tamale that you don’t
like, you can’t blame them. They’re telling it from their perspective – so how
about you as a Ghanaian go to Tamale so you can tell your own story and own
that story.”

Destination
Ghana

‘Girl
Going Places’ first hit the web earlier this year and has already attracted a
growing following. The first series consists of six episodes featuring a mix of
Ghanaian destinations Adjei visited for the first time, her favourite eateries
and spots for buying locally-made fashion. “It is something like a guide for
coming to Ghana,” she said.

Although
born in Ghana, Adjei moved to the UK in her teens and then to the US for
university. She has a BA is Psychology and a MS in Healthcare/ Finance
Administration. After over a decade in the US, she decided to return home for
good, touching down on home soil in December 2012. From there,
she cultivated a love for exploring the country of her birth.

“I
decided to take the rest of 2013 off after I moved and the only thing I wanted
to do was travel around Ghana," she said. "As I started travelling, I started thinking I
should document this because I was travelling around, I was telling my peers,
my friends, my family who had no idea that these places existed - no idea where
they were. So I thought it was a good idea to document it and reemphasise the
importance of us travelling our own space first.”

Favourite
destination

Her
first and favourite trip so far has been her visit to Likpe – a town in Ghana’s
Volta region. “I loved it because I had no idea what to expect,” she said. “I
knew that I was going to see caves but when I got there, I didn’t realise
it was a hike – an hour hike! When I finally got up the mountain, the views of
Ghana from there were the most amazing views that I’ve ever seen. And I just
remember I kept standing there and thinking – I’m in Ghana…this is my
country…this is my country for real! It was actually my first trip so that
always stays with me - just recognising that there are just so many amazing,
beautiful and dynamic spaces in my own country.”

African
cities

The
first season has been well received and has already spurred some Ghanaians to
explore their country.

“Somebody
actually got in their car and drove from Accra to Likpe to go and see
the caves,” she said. “And I remember when I saw that I actually cried. This is
the purpose. This is what I want. Even if one person says, this is crazy, I’ve
never been to Aburi and just after the show they do that – I feel my job is
done.”

Adjei
is currently preparing for season two but viewers can expect a little twist.
“Next season, I will be going to eight different African cities. Ghana was sort
of a pilot season now I want to it’s about the continent.” she said.

She
will be travelling to Durban in South Africa on 8 November as the first port of
call with the other destinations following after.

Adjei
has a lot of plans for ‘Girl Going Places’ and although she wants her web
series to continue having an online home, she hopes to turn it into a TV series.

She
also dabbles in reupholstering furniture, a hobby she cultivated as a 'mental
health release' while living in Philadelphia, US.

“I
am a big fan of vintage so I was thrifting a lot and it’s something that I kind
of fell into,” she said. “I started reupholstering furniture for myself
throughout my house and people would come, see what I’d done and ask me to do
things for them. So when I came to Ghana, I think not too long after that the
Chale Wote festival came around, an architect friend who was participating in the festival approached me about collaborating on something.”

Chale
Wote is an alternative platform that brings art, music, dance and
performance out of the galleries and onto the streets of James Town in Accra.

“For
the 2013 event, I made giant chairs and then for 2014, I found these wooden
crates that were used to hold mineral bottles [in Ghana we call fizzy drinks
such as Coca Cola and Fanta minerals] back in the day. I found a whole crate of
them that some lady was going to burn for firewood and I used those to create
benches and put plants in them.”

Adjei
hasn’t ruled out pursuing a project that harnesses these creative
skills ... once she has more time on her hands. But for now, she is busy with
'An African City', which is entering its third season.

The
programme, which is a co-production with Nicole
Amarteifio launched in 2014. It charts the
experiences of five successful and professional women who return to Ghana from
the West to settle. The cast includes journalist Nana Yaa, Harvard
graduate and marketing manager Sade, Ngozi, who works for an international
development agency, Oxford graduate and lawyer Makena, and of course entrepreneur Zainab.

“Now
we are in the process of writing season three. Hopefully we will start
production soon. I can’t tell you anything but it is going to feature more
dynamic stories, new characters. Every season we want to introduce new
characters that mingle within the dynamic of the five girls," she said.

Home sweet
home

Like
the characters in ‘An African City’, Adjei does not regret returning to Ghana.
She said the turning point came when she landed in the US from a previous trip
to Ghana and saw her car parked at the airport covered in ice.
"I was in tears," she said. It is from there that she decided to
return home. Her advice to others considering returning to their roots is
simple.

“Be
clear on what it is you want to do," she said. "What in your wildest dreams would you
want to accomplish in Ghana. "Once you know that just hit
the ground running, fear nothing, if things are not moving at the pace that you
are used to do not discouraged because you know we move at a different pace.
Things take three times longer. Network, find people who are interested in
what you are doing. But I think the biggest thing is not to give up because it
is so easy to get frustrated and think, I can't find the money for this, I can’t
find somebody who can do this. So you just have to focus, don’t give up and I
think you will be fine.”

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